public health professor at UCLA isn't very worried about a bird flu pandemic, at least this year

James R. “Rick” Greenwood, adjunct professor of epidemiology at the UCLA School of Public Health and director of the UCLA Office of Environmental Health and Safety

Later the same day, Etopia Media Medical News Network spoke with James R. “Rick” Greenwood, adjunct professor of epidemiology at the UCLA School of Public Health and director of the UCLA Office of Environmental Health and Safety about preparations for a possible avian influenza pandemic.

Asked about a consensus of the public health community about how to prepare for a possible bird flu pandemic, Mr. Greenwood said, "people are all over on what the appropriate strategy is." He indicated his belief that the emergence of a strain of avian influenza capable of being transmitted on a human-to-human basis, and thus capable of generating a global pandemic, was less likely than many commentators had suggested, saying, "in a sense, it's new territory. So it's going to be played out over the next few months, and, if I'm correct they [in the U.S.] probably won't even need to use Tamiflu® at all."

Mr. Greenwood also indicated that he thought it would make more sense overall to invest what extra money becomes available to be used in preparing for an avian influenza pandemic in searching for new and innovative ways to more rapidly and effectively produce vaccines against bird flu using methods developed by the biotechnology industry, including those used to produce "DNA vaccines," such as those now being developed at companies like Vical Corporation in San Diego, California, rather than relying on the fertilized egg-based "legacy" technology that has been used for decades, and which is subject (as are the newer methods, Mr. Greenwood pointed out) to the kinds of problems experienced during the previous flu season by Chiron Corporation, recently tapped by the U.S. Government to produce $62.5 million in fertilized egg-based "legacy" vaccines designed to work against the currently circulating "animal-to-human" strains of the H5N1 avian influenza virus, which vaccines may (or may not) prove to be effective against whatever mutated, recombined, or newly-evolved variant of this pathogen eventually emerges with the capacity to be spread directly on a "human-to-human" basis and thus is able to generate a global bird flu pandemic.

You can listen to this exclusive audio interview with Rick Greenwood from UCLA, in its entirety, by clicking here.

more about Chiron and related subjects

Weakened by last year's vaccine contamination debacle, and looking as tasty a take-over target as an invading bacterium looks to a macrophage, Chiron Corporation was swallowed up by Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis a few days ago, on Halloween Day, 2005.

Chiron Corporation was co-founded by Edward E. Penhoet, Ph.D., President, Gordon ("Moore's Law") and Betty Moore Foundation; currently a member of the Chiron Board of Directors; and Vice-Chair of the Independent Citizens' Oversight Committee (ICOC), the governing board of the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM).

Both of these institutions were created by the passage, a year ago yesterday, of Proposition 71, the California Stem Cell Initiative. For more information about that part of the bio-technology landscape, click on the titles of Stem Cell Wars, Volume 1 and Stem Cell Wars, Volume 2, Chapter 1.

For a copy of Dr. Penhoet's testimony, in his role as Vice-Chair of the ICOC and Chair of its Intellectual Property Committee, before the "Joint Information Hearing" called by various committees of the California Legislature to consider matters pertaining to who should benefit, and on what terms, from the $6 billion investment by California taxpayers in bio-medical research under the provisions of Proposition 71, click here.

Los Angeles Times reports on inadequate funding in preparation for possible bird flu pandemic

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times, in an article published today, November 3, 2005, written by Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar and Charles Piller, Times staff writers, with contributions from Times staff writer Karen Kaplan, and entitled "Bush's Flu Pandemic Plan Leans Heavily on Agencies Already Strained," said that:

"The Bush administration's $7.1-billion flu pandemic plan cannot succeed without the cooperation of many players, from local health departments to foreign governments in remote corners of the world. And in most cases, they are already spread thin…."
"Dr. Linda Rosenstock, dean of the UCLA School of Public Health, said the costs were being heaped onto health systems already under pressure to meet daily needs.

"'We have had evidence for decades of erosion of the public health infrastructure,' including labs, training and communication systems, she said….

"In a severe pandemic, about 90 million Americans would fall ill and 1.9 million would die, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

"The Bush plan includes $251 million to help poor countries track and contain the disease in Asia, the epicenter of the outbreak.

"Some public health experts said more money was needed. A lack of funds and scientific expertise have made some Southeast Asian countries slow and ineffective in controlling bird flu.

"'We are thinking very small for what is a global problem. We are thinking very U.S.-centric,' said UCLA's Rosenstock."

 

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